Jordan Gray wonders if saying “my girlfriend” versus “my woman” is really all that different.
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I have been writing about intimate relationships for the Good Men Project for over six months, and during that time I’ve noticed something interesting.
Whenever I use any variation of the phrase “your man/woman” in regards to an intimate relationship, someone always comments on it.
For example, when I titled my articles “3 Ways To Open Your Woman Sexually” or “When And How To Love Your Woman” people took offence to the ownership element of me saying “your woman”.
“People don’t belong to each other!”
“Your partner isn’t property to own!”
And, to an extent, I would kindly disagree.
I’m going to throw it over to one Mr. Paul Varjak (the leading male protagonist in Breakfast At Tiffany’s)…
“You know what’s wrong with you, Miss Whoever-you-are? You’re chicken, you’ve got no guts. You’re afraid to stick out your chin and say, “Okay, life’s a fact, people do fall in love, people do belong to each other, because that’s the only chance anybody’s got for real happiness.” You call yourself a free spirit, a “wild thing,” and you’re terrified somebody’s gonna stick you in a cage. Well baby, you’re already in that cage. You built it yourself. And it’s not bounded in the west by Tulip, Texas, or in the east by Somali-land. It’s wherever you go. Because no matter where you run, you just end up running into yourself.”
Even though the film came out in 1961 and has some embarrassingly outdated themes in it, George Peppard’s quote still rings true for me today.
“People do fall in love. People do belong to each other…”
And while it’s certainly safer and potentially more politically correct to only ever acknowledge people as autonomous free-spirits, there is something to be said about the safety, security, and romance of having an intimate partnership where you and your partner belong to or “own” each other to a certain degree.
Just the other day I was talking to someone about my amazing, inspiring partner when I referred to her as “all mine”. My word choice put a thorn in their side because they immediately shot back with “Oh she’s YOURS, is she? She belongs to you?” To which I replied, “Yes. Yes, she does. I can you show you the receipt to prove it.”
Needless to say they didn’t find the situation as amusing as I did.
So where do we draw the line?
Wedding rings are symbols of eternal love, but are they not also markers of ownership?
Is saying “my girlfriend” or “my wife” fine, but “my woman” isn’t? Is one necessarily more dehumanizing than the other because some of them are relational words as opposed to gendered words?
I realize that this is all semantics and will only ever matter on an individual level… but I’m so fascinated whenever someone takes issue with my use of possessive language in my writing.
What do you think? Do you find it offensive when someone refers to their partner as “my man/my woman”? What verbiage do you prefer to use with your partner, or with your past partners?
Let me know in the comments below.
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Photo courtesy of DepositPhotos.com
My guy is mine he belongs to me, he is mine. I am his, I belong to him. It’s not about owner ship like property. It is about my heart that he holds, and his heart that I hold. If someone doesn’t get that then I’m sorry for them.
My man calls me his woman all the time, and never once has it bothered me. I think it has to do with the way he says it. To me, it is a term of respect because he sees me as more than just a girl, the way that “girlfriend” sometimes tends to imply. When I think of the terms “girlfriend” and “boyfriend” it takes me back to middle and high school, where relationships were silly things boys and girls had. I call him my man because I have the utmost respect for the way he handles his adult responsibilities.… Read more »
One thing strikes me: “my” in and of itself does not just imply ownership, it also implies association. No one would confuse “my road” with ownership of that, road it is simply the road that one happens to be on. Perhaps it’s a mundane semantic point, but the notion of close association is probably mostly responsible for the use of the word my when referring to people with whom we are in relationships of various types (e.g. My boss, my sister, my spouse etc…). That being said, the question of belonging to is also somewhat distinct from the question of… Read more »
Maybe we trip over the term “belong to.” It seems our society is so bent on telling us how incredibly FREE we are while at the sme time debasing the social constructs we have in place to remind us, “hey freedom only comes as a facet of understanding our unity.”
So do I belong to my girlfriend? I’d gladly sacrifice a sliver of freedom to say “I’m off the market. I’m HER’S!” Are we afraid to proclaim that? Or are we just “too individual” to, Ya know, “belong” to someone?
First. words matter, putting words to something creates an identity; makes that thing real. Woman is a word that describes a human being Girlfriend is a word that describe a type of relationship with a person. My girlfriend is saying the women with whom I’m in an intimate relationship with. My woman is saying the woman who I own. It’s really not that hard to figure out the proper use of words. and even if you couldn’t figure out proper use of words, “my woman” wouldn’t be so offensive if there weren’t thousands of years of recorded slavery that goes… Read more »
Honestly, I don’t find it offensive at all. It’s the other way around. I am flattered when my partner calls me “my woman” because, as you said, we belong to each other. Although, I am from a different culture where a woman is a “belonging,” which I certainly disapprove, the feeling of belonging to a man, and him belonging to me, creates and nurtures intimacy. Love your article and I definitely agree with you.
I think people who get upset over the use of “my” WRT partners and spouses, are just too sensitive, as the word is also used to outline interpersonal relations, and not merely “ownership”.
Or do you also think i is implying ownership over people, if I’m for instance is talking about my parents, my distant cousin,or my great-great-great-parents who emigrated to America? (Yes, I really own them! Got’em locked up right here in my bank vault. Y’wanna see’em…?)
I kind of want to be “his woman”… and I want him to be my man. For me, I feel safe and comfortable in it. Also…might it help define our exclusivity to each other?
I watched something on TV where they read from a 20s car manual, and there it said “Have your man do the following steps …” I puzzled for a moment why this manual appeared to be written for lady drivers, of which I had not assumed that there had been so many in the 20s … then it hit me: It was for rich people and “my man” had the historic meaning, i.e. my servant. 😀
Great analysis Therorema! But I would add to that context, in that it would depend on how a guy said “my woman” to me. It certainly be used in jest, right? Interesting thing to think about and discuss though, as our words are very important, they both reflect and affect our thoughts and actions.
There’s a massive difference between “this is my partner/boyfriend/girlfriend/man/woman/what have you” and “owning” someone, I think; there are a lot of people out there who do treat their significant others like they’re simply property, or toys to get jealous and petty over. These are the people we refer to as abusers, usually. “This is my girlfriend/wife” denotes a connection in relation with the speaker. “This is my woman” doesn’t suggest the kind of intimate, equal partnership– anyone can be someone’s “woman”, perhaps, but only someone with special privileges gets to be someone’s wife. Same with “my man”. I’d never call… Read more »
Of course people don’t belong to each other or even worse, “own” each other. That makes them sound like property, not people. That said, someone who gets upset about someone saying “my woman” is being far too sensitive. I hear people say “my man” all the time and no one gets upset – why does it only seem to be wrong in the reverse?
Relationships are a form of giving yourself to someone. What are you after you give yourself but someone else’s? We all share ownership of ourselves with whoever we share ourselves with, to the degree that we give ourselves.
Semantics, woop! ^_^
I don’t have a strong opinion on the issue but on a semantic level there is a clear difference:
A woman is a girlfriend with respect to a man who is her boyfriend (or Lesbian girlfriend). The description girlfriend only exists with reference to that other person, so adding the reference “my” merely gives more information. However a woman is a woman without reference to anybody except herself so adding “my” here may understandably be seen as taking possession of her.
I’m married myself, so totally understand the concept that my wife ‘belongs’ to me, just as I ‘belong’ to my wife (mutual ownership of a sort) up until the time we no longer have this relationship. But as a writer, I would imagine you should appreciate the subtle nuances different words engender. For example: I don’t mind vs I don’t care. Black vs Coloured. Bossy vs Assertive. Any other Yin/Yang type comparisons you want to make. Why then is it so hard to understand the nuance that this brings across in an age where feminism is at the forefront of… Read more »
Yes! This conversation needs to happen. In dating over the last year I’ve noticed an over sensitivity from some women. They seem to be torn between wanting a relationship and ensuring their sense of independence (which I would argue their concept of that is limited, but I digress). One woman I dated referred to me as her man earlier on when she was obviously smitten, yet near the end I seemed to touch a nerve when I referred to her in a similar way. I think there’s a difference between making a statement like that as a term of endearment… Read more »
Good piece. Good point.
If you are going to be intimately entwined with another person then, yeah, that is a unifying action.
I don’t find it offensive or dehumanizing at all to be referred to as “my woman/partner/gf”. Infact, I like the idea of belonging to another person. I like the possive term. I know that it’s not indicitive of some kind of “slave” like status of “owning” someone else. I would hope my man would consider me *his* and not just *that woman I date*. That would be pretty unromantic in my book.
Agreed! Well said. Thank you Erin 🙂